On his general condition: Arafat is “in good health. They’ve put all the tumors on him in existence, but all he has is acute gastritis.”
On his health compared with other men his age: “He’s normal. He’s tired, and I don’t blame him. He lives in abnormal conditions. His room is tiny and has no window. The oxygen level is low. He doesn’t see the sun. [But] he’s in good spirits. Whenever I feel low, believe me, I call him.”
On reports that he’d been deliberately poisoned with a substance that’s hard to trace: “I took along an expert in blood examination and we took blood samples and tested them for several days. He said he couldn’t find any abnormality.”
On whether his tremor is Parkinson’s disease: “No. It’s a benign positional tremor. Sometimes the tremors increase with tension and anxiety. He never had Parkinson’s.”
On what kind of patient Arafat is: “He mainly likes to eat vegetables and occasionally fish and chicken. He gives himself to God and says, ‘Let God do whatever needs to be done.’ He has no phobias.”
